August 30, 2005
Tar pond clean-up contract awarded
SYDNEY, N.S.
The cleanup of a notorious toxic waste site is taking a step forward with the unveiling of plans to redirect a brook near Sydney’s tar ponds.
RDL Construction Ltd. has won a $6.3-million contract to construct new channels for the Coke Ovens Brook.
The tiny waterway cuts diagonally across the old coke ovens site at an abandoned steel plant and has, for decades, carried contaminants into the nearby tar ponds.
The 31-hectare tar ponds property contains 700,000 tonnes of contaminated sludge, which is the run-off of nearly 100 years of steel-making in the Cape Breton city.
Last summer, an engineering report by ADI Ltd. recommended dividing the brook into two branches.
Energy Minister Cecil Clarke said redirecting the brook will make it easier and simpler to clean up the tar ponds and the coke ovens property.
“This project marks the first concrete step in cleaning up contamination at the Coke Ovens,” he told a news conference.
The project will be carried out through next year’s construction season.
Part of the new channels will be piped underground, and portions of both branches will be lined with synthetic material or clay to prevent further contamination.
The project calls for fish to eventually be reintroduced into the brook.
Ottawa and the provincial government have agreed to spend $400 million to clean up the tar ponds.
Last spring, the federal environment minister ordered a full panel environmental assessment of the plan to dig up and burn most of the toxic sludge.
Canadian Press
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